


The Laws of Defiance

by Lady_Therion



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV), Stargate Universe
Genre: Anyelle, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-26
Updated: 2015-07-26
Packaged: 2018-04-11 08:09:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4427861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Therion/pseuds/Lady_Therion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An object at rest will stay at rest unless acted on by an outside force...and that is how Belle French entered the life Nicholas Rush.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Laws of Defiance

**Author's Note:**

  * For [herstorybooks](https://archiveofourown.org/users/herstorybooks/gifts).



*******

**An object at rest will remain at rest unless acted on by an outside force.**

The first time they meet, they are at a pub.

Or rather, the university’s shite excuse for one. Rush hasn’t had a decent pint since he arrived in the states. Neither has she, by the look of things. She hasn’t even ordered a drink, and instead pages through a novel as thick as his fist. The title is in Greek. Occasionally, she pauses to check her phone.

About a half hour passes before the bartender drops by with a glass of beer and an expression of pity. “On the house,” he says, and slides it over.

She smiles politely, but doesn’t touch it. Instead she looks at two tickets in her hands. _Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid._ The time stamp says 8:15.

Rush glances at his watch. It’s 10:30.

“You’ve been staring at me.”

He doesn’t think she’s speaking to him at first. But then, she isn’t looking at him either. Instead, she’s smirking at the countertop like it just told her a private joke. Then he realizes that she is actually smirking at _him_ , and that he was probably the joke.

He shifts uncomfortably.

“You’re only half right,” he says. “I was staring at your book.”

She turns to him. Her blue eyes are deep and searching for answers. There’s a flush of warmth that he can’t explain away with alcohol, and he doesn’t like it for that reason alone.

“Ah,” she says. “You’re a fan of _The Odyssey?_ ”

“Overrated,” he says. “Much like this place.”

“Mm,” she says, and raises her still full glass. “Cheers to that.”

There is a part of him that bristles because the act of sustaining a two-way conversation that did not turn hostile has become embarrassingly unfamiliar. _She_ , on the other hand, either doesn’t notice his ineptitude or chooses not to comment on it.

“This is usually the part where we introduce ourselves,” she says.

He can’t help but smile, though he knows it barely rates as one—just a small turn in the corner of his mouth. How long has it been since he had done that involuntarily?

“I’m not much for idle pleasantries.”

“That’s too bad,” she says, and sticks out a hand. “Hello, I’m Belle French.”

He doesn’t take it, not right away. But when he does, all he can think of was how small her fingers are. Then, somewhere in the periphery of his vision, there is a halo of light …like a tunnel leading him…leading him where? And then there are numbers. But that can’t be right…

“Is everything all right?”

Her voice is gentle and concerned.

He snaps his head up, and there is a dull throb somewhere in his temple. “Dr. Rush.”

“Pardon?”

“Call me Dr. Rush,” he says with a touch of impatience that he does not regret—he does _not_.  

He gestures to her book.

“The, ah, title is in Mycenaean.”

“What? Oh… A bit of a linguist, are you?” She dog-ears the page she was on and puts it away in her purse.

“You could say that,” he says. “And you? There’s not many that would consider that light reading.”

She sighs. “No, no there’s not.”

She doesn’t answer his question, and he hears a vague note of disappointment in her voice. He notices because he does the same thing when he thinks of people who have no respect for his work.

His eyes fall on the tickets.

“Looks like you missed your show,” he says, and immediately wishes that he didn’t.

She looks at her tickets.

“Yeah… looks like my date didn’t go so well after all.”

He doesn’t know what to say to that either. For once, he cannot offer an expert opinion.

Now she is taking delicate sips of her beer. “It’s a shame really, I’ve never seen it.”

“Never?”

“No, never.”

There is no logical explanation for what he does next. But there is something gnawing at him. It is very near the feeling that he gets when he knows he is close to solving something…a base urgency that drives him to do things he would otherwise not do.

Like ask a young woman, and a complete stranger at that, to see an old picture.

“There’s an 11:30 at the Landmark on Kitteridge. If we leave now…”

There is a large part of his brain that keeps saying, _Now, surely she won’t._ They are two strangers colliding together in a random situation with only a one in fifty chance of occurring in the first place—and that was with some generous rounding.

_Now, surely she won’t._

But then…to his utter bewilderment…she does.

“Yeah, let’s go.”

***

**The acceleration of object is directly proportional to the magnitude of the force acting on it.**

The second time they meet, it is after class.

He is buried six feet under midterms when he gets a call in his office. It’s Belle and she is wondering if he’s free for lunch.

“I’m thinking we can go to the park,” she says, cheerily.

He weighs the possibility in his mind as he taps his pencil in a rapid fire on his desk. They have not seen each other since the night they saw _Butch Cassidy_. When was that? A week ago? It was getting more and more difficult for him to keep track of time.

“How did you get this number?”

There is a pause on the other end. And he knows. He _knows_ that he is being an arse. But there was that gnawing in the back of his mind again, and he just _has_ to have a reasonable answer.

_Because that night…_

“I looked you up in the directory,” she says.

“Ah yes,” he says, rubbing his eyes. “Yes, of course.”

Then, he remembers her telling him that she is an adjunct professor in the Department of Linguistics. This was her first year teaching here. He remembers dryly offering her his condolences.

“I’m getting the feeling that you don’t like me much, Dr. Rush.” He can hear pages fluttering in the background, like she was packing up her things—leaving her office for the day, probably. “If you don’t, just say so. I won’t pine after you. Not much anyway, I promise.”

And he laughs out loud at that, startling himself. Because the thought of anyone pining after him was just…he just…

“I can meet you on the quad in ten,” he says.

There is another pause.

“I’ll bring some sandwiches.”

***

He waits for her at a park bench and tries to remember that night.

They were sitting in a dark theatre. They were the only ones there, but even so he remembers her leaning over and whispering in his ear, “How long has it been since you last saw a movie?”

He is trying not to notice how she smells like jasmine.

“I’m usually not one for distractions.”

She snorts, but not in a condescending way.

Then the credits start to roll and neither of them say anything after. At some point (around the time Harvey Logan asks Butch Cassidy, “ _Guns or knives_?”) she takes a hold of his hand. Or…was it his hand that takes hers?

An edge of panic begins to flood his senses. This isn’t him and this is clearly all a mistake. But before he does anything, he sees that bright halo again…

And the chair that he sits in is no longer in the theatre, it is in a room at the end of a mysterious corridor…and there is someone close by whispering his name…and there are the numbers, those infuriating and incomprehensible numbers… and this time they are leading him…

“There you are.”

Belle sits next to him on the park bench, a little basket under her arm. There is a slant of light that pierces through the copse of trees, and somehow it makes her eyes more blue and her cheeks more rosy— _actually_ rosy. Christ, it was like walking into an Audrey Hepburn picture. There would be singing and shenanigans soon enough.

“You look distracted,” she says.

“No,” he says. “It’s just, ah…”

There is that dull throbbing again. There is a voice somewhere growing louder, more frantic…

_Dr. Rush! Dr. Rush! Someone wake him up. No, it’s too dangerous. You’re going to kill him. And put the rest of the crew at risk?_

He was _supposed_ to be doing something…

“Oh my God. You’re bleeding.”

Belle pulls out a handkerchief and presses it against his nose. He clutches as it as the red stuff dribbles down his shirtfront.

“Here, lean back,” she says, and whether out of pity or out of instinct, she begins to stroke his hair. It’s a soft and tentative touch, as feathery and fleeting as a bird’s wing. She is testing her boundaries, he realizes, because she wants to offer him comfort.

In that suspended moment, he thinks of all the strange things he has studied and encountered…and how Belle French might be the strangest of them yet. And that was saying something.

_Dr. Rush! Dr. Rush!_

Eventually, the bleeding stops and he balls up the handkerchief in his hand. She is looking at him with wide and worried eyes. “Do you want to go home?”

“Home?”

“Yes home,” she says, taking his hand again. “I can help you get home.”

“No one can help me.” Though he doesn’t shake her off as he was wont to do with everyone else. It’s as if she were an anchor, and if he let go he would find himself adrift—lost forever in a dark abyss. It’d be poetic, he thinks. But it was also pitiful.

“Tell me, O Muse,” he slowly recites. “Of the man of many devices, who wandered full many ways after he had sacked the sacred citadel of Troy. Many were the men whose cities he saw and whose mind he learned, aye, and many the woes he suffered in his heart upon the sea seeking…seeking…”

He looks at Belle and she finishes it for him. “Seeking to win his own life and the return of his comrades.”

There is a silence that passes in between them.

“Homer’s _Odyssey_ ,” he says quietly.

“I thought you weren’t a fan.”

“No,” he laughs, though he doesn’t know why. “No, I’m not.”

He grasps her hand tighter.

“I’d like to go home now,” he says.

She nods with an understanding that makes his heart twist—and here he thought he crushed to dust the day that Gloria died.

***

**For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction** _._

As it turns out, they did not end up at his home. He staunchly refuses to return to a place that reminds him of his failings. So Belle takes him to her apartment and makes them both tea.

“Here,” she says, handing him a chipped cup. “Things never seem quite as bleak after a cup of tea.”

He’s doubtful about that. “Do they now?”

“You’re the reason I decided to take the job you know,” she says as she pours a fresh pot of Earl Grey. “I read your papers on Ancient Technology. The bits on your translations were particularly fascinating. I used them as a basis for my thesis.”

“That’s quite a risk. It nearly got me ex-communicated from the scientific community.”

She winks.

“But also a golden ticket into the Stargate program.”

He sputters. “I thought that was classified.”

“It is…Dr. Jackson approached me too.”

“He what?”

“He heard of my work in historical etymology, classical linguistics…and alien philology. As you can imagine, the program thought that might be useful. He also heard of my pleasant disposition, which he said would come in handy in case you refused.”

_In case he refused…?_

“That means that…”

“That’s right. If you decided to stay on Earth, I would have gone to Icarus in your stead.”

He feels his vision grow cloudy as things begin to click into place. There are voices again, beckoning to him from a dark and distant shore….

_Dr. Rush! Dr. Rush!_

He was _supposed_ to be doing something…looking for someone…

But then Belle laces her fingers through his and the voices grow quiet.

“Do you understand now?” She says. “Have you found what you’re looking for?”

A bead of sweat races down his brow. “I don’t…I don’t know. Please, I’m sorry…I don’t…”

“Shh, shh,” she says. Then she leans over to press a cool kiss against his brow. Then he hears her voice whisper against the shell of his ear. “It’s all right now, Rush. You don’t have to be alone now. I’ll take you home.”

Home.

“Yes. I’d like to go home.”

The rest of their actions come in sweet blurs.

Somehow they make their way to her couch, hastily shedding his clothes.

She is pressing her lips against his in wet and eager kisses that he clumsily returns. He is out of practice, and there is a large part of his brain that is screaming for him to stop.

“We shouldn’t…no, we shouldn’t…” And loses the rest of what he is about to say, because she is mouthing at his neck in a way that makes him shiver.

“Tell me to stop,” she says as she pushes him back against the couch. She removed her blouse and begins to unhook her bra. “Tell me to stop, and I will. I _will_.” And she says this fiercely so that he knows that she means it.

God, it’s been so long…it’s been _so_ long….

There are trails of fire wherever she touches him and he feels like he’s being burned alive and made anew. And it’s clear that her sweet mouth and clever fingers are keeping the voices at bay. But there’s something else too, some invisible cord of trust that he hadn’t been able to find. But he found it now, and it held them inextricably together—his heart to hers.

And suddenly, her words echo into his skull.  

_Do you understand now? Have you found what you’re looking for?_

Yes, _yes_ , he wants to say, wants to _shout_ , but can’t because he is choking on them.

Then she sinks onto him—all the way down—and he thinks that he’s losing his mind as he’s filling her. And that’s just as well, because he wants to fill her to the fucking _brim._

“Oh God. _Yes_ ,” he says, grunting in a way that he knows he’ll be embarrassed about later.

It’s this, he thinks frantically, _this_ as she moans and mewls above him. He pants as he bucks his hips and she digging her nails into his shoulders in a way he knew would leave bruises. And he wants her to. Oh God, he wants her to. Because he wants to leave here with this memory, with the knowledge that this happened…

He wants to remember what it was like to find _peace._

Then she is coming, she is _coming,_ fluttering and flaming all around his cock _—_ this sweet and ardent little woman who could have been flung to the other side of the universe in his stead….

Then she arches, and her mewls turn into shrieks as she throws her head back. And then he is done for. He thrusts once, twice and floods her with his heat, grinding and pulsing his way through a climax that rips through his body.

He shudders through his high and pulls her close in a desperate grip, feeling her breasts against his heaving chest.

She leans up and kisses his brow.

“It’s time for you to go home now.”

*******

**What goes up must come down.**

_Dr. Rush! Dr. Rush!_

Rush opens his eyes.

It’s Eli, grinning madly with relief.

“He’s back! Guys! Guys! He’s back.”

“He is?” It’s Brody this time. “Oh God. I thought we lost him this time.”

Rush raises himself from the interface chair and retches before stumbling into TJ. “Easy, easy,” she says.

A pair of leather boots swims into his hazy view and he knows without looking up that it is Colonel Young with a sour expression on his face.

“You pulled one hell of a stunt there, Rush. I hope it was worth it.”

Rush spits before haphazardly wiping his face. “It was.”

TJ steadies him as he lurches to the side. “Where did you go?”

“I was…I was on Earth. Destiny…Destiny showed me the something.”

“Was it a memory?” asks Eli. “Did you go back into the past?”

Rush shook his head. “Not the past, no.”

“What did you _see_ , Rush?” Young is growing impatient.

_Blue eyes, rosy cheeks, a chipped cup and a scent of jasmine…_

TJ steadies him as he rises to his feet, then he waves her off as he staggers down the corridor. “I need the communication stones, there’s someone I need to find.”

“Can this someone help us get home?” Young yells after him.

Rush turns, swaying as he leans against the cold walls of the ship.

“Well, it’s a start.”

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Written as an RCIJ gift for belleandherstorybooks, who prompted: Rushbelle, Destiny, defiant Belle, SMUT!
> 
> 2\. Quotes in bold are paraphrases of Newton’s Laws of Motion, as well as the observation of gravity.


End file.
